ALCS Game 3: This Is Happening

Thoughts and notes on a dominating Game 3 win, including E-Rod, Schwarber, JD, and my gosh I can't even remember anymore this is so much fun

The Red Sox liked Game Two so much they decided to play it over again, this time in Boston. It was fun the second time too!

On Monday night the Boston Red Sox once again mercilessly stomped the Houston Astros, winning 12-3, and taking a two-games-to-one lead in the American League Championship Series. I was rewatching the highlights to refresh my memory before writing and I’m glad I did because I swear I forgot Rafael Devers homered. It was the kind of night where you could forget one of the best players on the Red Sox hit a home run.

We’ll get into all of it in a second, but first this is Sox Outsider, a Red Sox newsletter written by me, Matt Kory. I’ve written at The Athletic, FanGraphs, Sports on Earth, and Baseball Prospectus, and now I’m covering the Red Sox here. I’d love to have you subscribe and come along for the ride! All you have to do is press that subscribe button. It’s free and easy, so let’s go!

No Complaints

This was the incredibly rare post-season game without a single thing to complain about. Nobody on the Red Sox did anything wrong. Nothing. They hit, they hit for power, they took pitches, they took advantage of Astros errors, they made good defensive plays, and they pitched well.

Oh, wait, Eduardo threw a bad pitch. One. And Kyle Tucker hit it for a three-run homer, but that’s it. Other than that one mis-located pitch, the Red Sox were virtually perfect. The offense dominated early and the pitching staff just had to keep things reasonable, which they did. Heck, the last two scoreless innings were thrown by Martin Perez and Hirokazu Sawamura, two pitchers who I swore should only see the mound if the Red Sox were up 20 runs, down 20 runs, or everyone else on the pitching staff had mysteriously stepped into a wormhole in time and were all back in the middle ages fighting the Visigoths. But here’s the thing, Perez and Sawamura were better than five of the six pitchers the Astros used last night!

It’s hard to believe or even understand the level of dominance the Red Sox have achieved over the Astros over the last two games. Boston has been better than Houston in all phases of the game, hitting, hitting for power, hitting for average, selectivity at the plate, relief pitching, starting pitching, and fielding. Oh and the Red Sox mascot is better.

If you told me this would happen after they lost two of three to the Orioles in late September, I’d have engaged you in friendly conversation while frantically dialing 9-1-1 under the table.

Astros Pitching Is A Problem (For Them)

It’s one thing to get dominated like Houston just did, but planning out the pitching matchups, this was the game the Astros really needed to win. They had probably their best healthy starter on the mound in Jose Urquidy, and no real idea who would be available or healthy enough to start for them in Games Four or Five. So they really needed Urquidy to not only pitch well, but to pitch well into the game.

Didn’t happen on either count. Instead, the Red Sox mashed Urquidy, dropping six runs on him and knocking him out of the game before the end of the second inning. In fairness to Urquidy, he did get Christian Arroyo to ground into what probably should’ve been an inning ending double play, but with the bases loaded Jose Altuve couldn’t handle a high hop, a run scored on the play and the bases were reloaded. That brought up Kyle Schwarber who did this:

Red Sox @RedSox

The GRANDEST of Schwarbombs!

Yes, another grand slam. Ho hum. I mean, wake me up when the Red Sox DON’T hit a grand slam, amirite??? But seriously folks, that was kinda the ball game right there. It was 6-0, two of the next three Red Sox hitters singled, and that was all for Urquidy.

Relative to his teammates performance through the series, Urquidy wasn’t terrible. No Astros starter has made it out of the third inning against the Red Sox. Peter Abraham of the Boston Globe summed up the Astros starters’ stats for us:

Pete Abraham @PeteAbe

Astros starters this series: 5.1 IP 13 H 14 R 12 ER 8 BB 5 K 3 HR

That’s a 20.25 ERA for those scoring at home. Astros manager Dusty Baker called the performance of his starters “a reoccurring nightmare.”

The Astros have announced they will start Zack Greinke in Game Four today. According to Alex Speier of the Boston Globe, Greinke has pitched 3.1 innings since September 19th, or a third of a game in a month. Based on that, I’m guessing Greinke won’t go deep into the game, and so the Astros will ask their bullpen, a bullpen that has thrown 21.2 of a possible 27 innings in this series, to again get the majority of outs against an offense that is not only very good, but is the best possible version of itself.

The Astros will likely have a team approach to Game Four. A few innings from Greinke, if possible, then two or three from Cristian Javier, the Astros reliever who struck out four Red Sox in two innings back in Game One. After that, probably Kendall Graveman and Ryan Pressly, both of whom haven’t pitched since Game One. That might be enough to get the Astros through most of the game, and actually, that’s not a bad pitching lineup at all.

The Red Sox Lineup

There are some things I’m scared to do. Leap out of an airplane, for example. I don’t like heights so just about anything involving falling or climbing makes my palms sweat. But I’m not sure there’s a more terrifying thing I can think of right now than standing on the Fenway Park mound to face the Boston Red Sox lineup.

Remember all that talk about how talented the Houston Astros hitters are and how deep their lineup is? All that is true, they just got the team wrong. The Red Sox are on another level right now. Who knows how long it’ll last (how about at least six more games), but my gosh, enjoy it while it’s here.

Mike Petriello @mike_petriello

Postseason baseball isn't always as simple as "pound the absolute crap out of the baseball," but the Red Sox are certainly making a good show out of it.

One more thing to note is that this has been going on all playoffs. The Red Sox scored six runs off of Gerrit Cole and the Yankees in the Wild Card game. They dropped 26 runs in three games on one of the best pitching staffs in baseball in the Rays. Now they’ve scored 25 runs on the Astros in three games. Call it what you want, a fluke, a hot streak, a new level. Whatever suits you. But it’s not a one day thing.

Eduardo

Another spot where most analysts thought Houston would have the advantage is starting pitching. I won’t rehash all of the above, but I do think that most people previewing this series didn’t think much of Eduardo Rodriguez. Look at his numbers this season and you can see why, but the educated Red Sox fan will know there’s much more to Eduardo than his unlucky numbers this season. This guy is a very good pitcher. He’s inconsistent, sure, but when he’s got it going on, he’s as good as anyone, and that’s the guy who showed up to Fenway last night.

E-Rod struck out four of the first six Astros he faced, and this is a team that, say it with me now:

Crowd: Does!
Crowd: Not!
Crowd: Strike!
Crowd: Out!

Except they did. Eduardo struck out seven Astros in six strong innings. The only real mistake he made was on an 0-2 pitch to Tucker where he left a slider/cutter (not sure) over the middle of the plate. The pitch was intended to be a foot outside but, well, it wasn’t. It was, to be clear, an awful pitch. But it ended up being Eduardo’s only blemish on the night. On the whole, he was fantastic, and exactly what the Red Sox needed.

The Red Sox have received 11.1 innings from Nate Eovaldi and Eduardo Rodriguez over the last two games. Garrett Whitlock and Tanner Houck have got to be as rested as any set of relievers has ever been in the middle of what’s supposed to be a tense, competitive ALCS. You half expected FOX to point a camera at the Red Sox pen and see Whitlock or Houck lying on a lounge chair holding a piña colada.

Where The Red Sox Are Now

Boston’s better relievers are rested, and Nick Pivetta, who has been pitching fantastically out of the bullpen, is starting today. They’re up in the series, and given the way the lineup has performed, have a real shot to take an even bigger series lead. So they’re in a good spot (duh).

If Boston can win today, they’ll need to win one of the final three games, one of which will be at home, and one of which will be started by Nate Eovaldi.

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Thanks for reading and subscribing! I’ll be back tomorrow with coverage of Game Four of the ALCS.